


ML7: Beginnings

by SilverNight104



Series: ML7 [1]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Adult Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Adult Marinette Dupain-Cheng, F/M, Gen, Miraculous Spy AU, Spy! Adrien, Spy! Marinette, Spy!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-09 10:14:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17405024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverNight104/pseuds/SilverNight104
Summary: Success has always been a word in Marinette's vocabulary. At least, until she finally meets her match.





	1. Mission: Infiltration

**Author's Note:**

  * For [iamcatchild](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamcatchild/gifts).



> For ML Secret Santa 2018! Happy holidays iamcatchild! It mentioned you were particularly fond of the Spy AU!
> 
> Betaed by the lovely Irene Clandestino and Whirlwish!

Marinette had had a variety of ‘jobs’ ever since she took up the profession, but this one was even more unusual than the norm. Information retrieval was common enough, but it normally didn’t also call for impersonation.

 

She recalled the printout handed over to that morning. The messenger: a brunette dressed in a plain red T-shirt and black capris. The scene: a lovely small cafe near the second arrondissement. The calm of the whole situation should have warned her, in retrospect.

 

“We do hope this will end up being a cooperative and fulfilling contract, mademoiselle.” The woman had said with a smile as she dropped spare change on the table before proceeding to vanish in the early morning rush.

 

> _Target: ML7 Agent Chat Noir_
> 
> _MO: Impersonate go-between Chloe Bourgeois to attain package held by agent. Meeting at Café Bar 21, 0000 hours. Delivery of package to contact at DC Bakery at 0300 hours. Payment upon completion. Avoid deaths and engage when necessary._
> 
> _Payment: 70,000 €_

 

Marinette had had only one experience with spy agencies before, and she instantly knew the job would not be easy. With that said, the money was well-worth it. It just meant she had to get several more weapons ready in the case her meeting turned into a shoot-out.

 

Impersonation was a skill of hers, though, and she figured that at least the mission would be worth a shot. Spy involvement did mean a better disguise than the norm though… sounded like a trip to the hairdresser was in order.

 

It was pathetically easy to find the go-between. Capturing her had been a lot harder. Being the mayor’s daughter and a social media addict, Marinette tracked her Instagram to find Chloe at the Grand Hotel in Paris.

 

Coming in as a normal civilian, Marinette made her way into the hotel, proceeding to lure a maid to the bathroom (“I need help, someone passed out in a stall” always worked) and sneaking to Chloe’s room after stealing her uniform and knocking the young employee out.

 

The blonde girl was talking in a demanding tone on the phone - back to the door, convenient - to a Sabrina about her next nail appointment when Marinette knocked (“ABOUT TIME” was her response). She waved off the tray of chocolates Marinette had picked up in the kitchen to a bedside table as she ended the call, only to start panicking as a cloth covered her mouth and nose.

 

Instantly, Chloe had struggled, lashing out with her elbow in a trained move, only to gasp once as Marinette jabbed the back of her neck and fell into unconsciousness.

 

Marinette frowned as she took in the sleeping heiress. She was trained in self-defense, as most people’s reactions would have been to either lash out wildly or knock the arm away.

 

She didn’t have time to ponder about it, immediately scaling the walls to cover the noticeable CCTVs in the room. Job done, she checked her phone for the signal emitted by any remaining devices, angling a yellow teddy bear emitting a particularly strong electronic signal to face towards the outside balcony.

 

The night sky was shining, and it was close to the bar’s opening hours. Evidently, her infiltration had taken far too long as it was. Working quickly, she bound the blonde, stuffing her into the ensuite bathtub as she gagged and blindfolded her.

 

Securely locking the door, she flipped through the girl’s Instagram once before she noticed a theme to the bars she had gone to. The blonde had worn her hair up in a ponytail, as was her signature style. However, she had black bangles on her arm and an oddly-shaped purse. To Marinette’s luck, both were on the opposite table.

 

Clearly the blonde had been preparing for her evening out. Donning the golden-yellow barely-knee length dress the blonde favored for evenings out, Marinette strapped a gun to her right inner thigh.

 

Tossing her dyed yellow hair into the same styled ponytail the blonde wore, she applied make up to her face. Chloe’s face was naturally wider and had more western features compared to her eastern ones - single eyelids versus her double, a higher nose and higher cheekbones - but it wasn’t as if the job had never called for her to impersonate all kinds of features before.

 

Spritzing the perfume Chloe favoured and slipping on the black bangles, Marinette picked up the pair of heels Chloe wore out on bar nights, slipping her phone into the pocket onto the strap of her left leg. She picked up the black, top-shaped purse, peering inside to find the girl’s phone, which she used to take a quick selfie and post to the blonde’s logged in Instagram - at least her followers wouldn’t be so easily alarmed, for now at least.

 

Checking no other traces of her presence were left in the room, Marinette left for the bar, locking the door to delay the inevitable attempted rescue of the mayor’s daughter.

 

* * *

 

The bar was loud, but the drinks were good. Knowing Chloe’s preferred cocktail of choice was a French 75 (thank goodness for Chloe’s social media!), she ordered it, before scanning the club discretely for the agent. The printout wasn’t detailed - ordinarily they weren’t; hitmen were paid to attain targets by any means necessary and her name wasn’t widespread enough to get attention from higher-ups in the underworld. Those missions were highly classified, they paid fortunes and had every resource available….  Along with a high increase in difficulty level - _there!_ Marinette caught the sight of a small group entering the club.

 

She glanced at the tail of the group, and recognised the way he was scanning the bar - like a spy searching for potential threats and exits -  and she signaled the bartender. “A 7&7, please.”

 

Eyes averted, she slid the drink to her right and waited as he made his way through the crowd, sliding into the unoccupied seat.

 

Out of the corner of her eye, she noted the man’s stature. Taller than her -  somewhat masked by Chloe’s heels though, with dark green eyes and dark brown hair. Glancing at his eyebrows though, her own rose. His eyebrows were blonde compared to the dark hair he sported. Either careless… or meant to throw her off.

 

She smiled hugely, her arms enveloping the man in a hug as she subtly patted him down - _ah, a suspicious bump in the left arm of his fitted suit_ \- and pulled him closer to her. To her surprise, he flinched minutely (either he didn’t like her, was onto her or just didn’t like female contact).

 

“I’m glad you could make it, Adrikins!” She trilled with Chloe’s simpering tone.

 

His eyes widened with shock as he grimaced slightly. “Chloe, I know you’ve had a bit much to drink,” He murmured as he eyed the four empty glasses and the new cocktail on the counter. “But no real names. I’m Noir, and you’re Queen, remember?”.

 

She nodded eagerly, leaning on his shoulder to his mild shudder. _Not used to female contact, then._

 

He drank once from the glass, and she slipped her right hand into his left, squeezing it slightly as her left deftly snatched the pendrive partially shoved into the lining of his sleeve.

 

“The information, Noir?” She asked as she withdrew her hand from his.

 

He nodded, before he reached into his sleeve. His expression furrowed as he felt empty air, before he stood up. “I’ll be back in a minute Queen, I need to go to the loo.”

 

She nodded, waiting for him to disappear behind the sign before she slid several euros over the counter and stalked through the crowd, letting her hair down as she went, hoping he wouldn’t immediately pick out the shining hair through the dim lights.

 

She had just walked out of the doorway when someone grabbed her hand and she was forcefully turned to face Noir and his murky green eyes.

 

“You’re not Chloe,” He growled, dragging her to the alleyway beside the club.

 

She gasped dramatically. “How could you say that Adrikins?! We’ve been together forever!”

 

“Nice try,” He said, backing her into the wall of the alleyway. “But Chloe always insists on at least one selfie together, and she would never call me by my alias on a mission.”

 

She sighed, knowing the game was up. At least the contract never stipulated the agent was supposed to be unharmed.

 

She leaned in close, warm breath against his ear as she whispered. “Then aren’t you going to take me in, agent?”

 

His pupils dilated and he took a sharp breath before her lips covered his and he was pulled into a passionate kiss. He pulled away, but her lips demanded more, and he relaxed into the kiss, a sweet smell permeating from her.

 

_Her lips tasted sweeter than Chloe’s usual lipstick -_ _wait wha_ -

 

Were his last thoughts as he slumped over her, unconscious. She smirked, before she hefted him further into the alley, just out of sight unless someone really wanted to investigate.

 

Tying her hair into a bun, she departed to the main road to hail a taxi, instructing the driver to bring her to a nearby hotel. She continued taking a chain of taxis, paying in cash and ensuring a different driver saw her each time.

 

_A tough mission. She would most definitely not have been walking out alive if Noir hadn’t been caught by surprise._

 

Marinette knew she wouldn’t be taking any more agent-involved missions, maybe not for a while. She loathed the time she spent running. She missed the times she could come back to a safe home with loving parents, didn’t have to worry if her enemies were chasing her, if she had enough luck to get out alive, if her next mission was more than she could handle.

 

She missed her mother’s warmth, and her father’s jokes. They raised her from the ground up - baking was one of their well-loved past times and she knew what the bakery meant to them-

 

“Dupain-Cheng bakery, Miss.”

 

Heaving a small breath, she paid the fare, and stepped out of the taxi to face her childhood home.

 

Irony. She never thought she’d be back here willingly one day.

 

She found the contact standing just outside the block, barely a few meters from the entrance.

 

The dark-haired woman looked Hispanic in appearance, and she nodded curtly as Marinette slipped her the flash drive.

 

Turning on her heel to leave, Marinette cocked her hand on her hip, fingers close to the gun if it turned into a fight.

 

“My payment?” She reminded the woman.

 

“In due time,” The woman said simply.

 

“You know that isn’t how it works.”

 

“But that is how it will work this time. Rest, and in the morning you will know the answers.”

 

Marinette gritted her teeth, but she knew that she couldn’t afford a fight here. “Very well,” she forced. She turned on her heel to make her way past the abandoned bakery to the small supermarket down the street.

 

She slipped past the customers to walk out the back entrance and down several alleyways where she entered her car and drove it down the Parisian streets to a small apartment complex.

 

One of her few safehouses, Marinette knew she would be abandoning this one after tonight. If only she had known the irony behind that statement.


	2. Answers... and more Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette gets her payment... in a rather unconventional fashion.

 

Marinette rose with the sun every morning, and the routine never changed. Strapping her gun to the inside pocket of her coat this time, Marinette set out dressed in a red blouse, black flare pants and a large brown trench coat.

 

Sunglasses covering her eyes from the scorching Parisian sun, Marinette twisted her still-blonde hair into the same bun from last night, fingering the taser and mace in her pockets. She knew it would be easier to claim self-defense with these weapons compared to a gun.

 

She was very much surprised when the woman who handed her the printout took the seat opposite her under the same cafe’s outside canopy, but the only reaction she showed was a twitch of her lips.

 

“Follow me,” the woman said, stalking off to the inside of the cafe. “I know a better place we can sit.”

 

Marinette reluctantly got up, but stuffed her left hand into the pocket with her mace. It had been a while since she had been double-crossed, but she knew it was inevitable if it came soon.

 

She followed the woman into the a dark room behind the cafe’s kitchen. Then light blinded her, and she withdrew the mace, spraying it into her nearby vicinity as she felt the floor give out and they began descending.

 

The woman coughed violently, and attempted to stop her only to no avail as Marinette blinked the spots out of her eyes and grabbed her gun.

 

“Hands up or I shoot,” Marinette demanded, slipping her spent mace into the pocket.

 

Immediately the woman put her hands up, sighing as she did so. “If that makes it easier…”

 

“How do I get out?”

 

The woman laughed. “Without your payment?”

 

“Life is worth more than money. I thought the last one who double-crossed me spent enough time in prison to spread enough rumours around?”

 

“He did.” She acquiesced. “But I’m here to invite you to a spy agency. We are in need of your talents.”

 

_Talents? She was proven, the missions she had taken clearly belied what she was capable of. Unless they didn’t know… and they wanted to see for themselves…._

 

Marinette gritted her teeth. “Then your mission was a test?”

 

“One that you passed with flying colours,” a voice said as the platform finally stopped, opening up into another equally bright room that appeared to be in the Parisian underground.

 

Marinette merely slid out her spare pistol to her left hand and trained it at the voice’s direction as she kept her eyes on the woman.

 

“Perhaps I should introduce myself. I am Agent Turtle of the ML7. This is handler Tikki. We require your talents.”

 

“Doesn’t sound like a good excuse to kidnap me,” Marinette bit back.

 

“It doesn’t, but we needed to know if you were what we needed.” Agent Turtle said, rather calmly for a person who roughly had a pistol aimed at their head.

 

“Forgive me if I don’t believe you.”

 

The voice’s owner moved into her view, revealing itself to be an old man dressed in a Hawaiian print shirt under a black suit.

 

“Months ago, one of our top agents escaped with inventory from the labs. He went rogue, using the equipment to gain control of the criminal underworld. He has utilised technologies to induce more innocents to his side. We believe he is attempting to overthrow our organisation to gain our most important secret.”

 

“And that would be?”

 

“Controlling time. His motives are unclear, but we do know he was seeking it.”

 

“Count me out. I have no desire to take on this kind of world saving thing. I’m not a hero.”

 

“But you consider lives most important, don’t you? After that bakery fire which killed your mother and left your father disabled?”

 

Her eyes widened with shock. “I know who you are, Marinette Dupain-Cheng, and I ask this of you. If you join us in this fight to liberate Paris of this evil, then we will help you. Your father will be provided for the rest of his life. We can protect him.”

 

Marinette let her guns drop to her side. She was utterly defeated. She knew she needed to protect her father, and they knew who she was.… She was so, so tired of running, and funneling the money to her father through multiple bank accounts… His upkeep was expensive, even with Marinette’s minimalist expenditures, her previous job as a fashion consultant could have never made enough to pay for his treatment.

 

“I accept.”

 

“Excellent. I expect Handler Tikki to brief you fully later, but you will be partnered with another agent during your time here. A precaution to stop you going rogue. Your name will be Agent Ladybug. No one here knows full names, as it is at their liberty to disclose. Equipment will be handled by the quartermaster, and missions issued to you by me. However, Ladybug, I think this is the appropriate time to mingle with the other agents.”

 

He led them to a room filled with a few other people relaxing on sofa sets. It was clearly a rec room. They all looked up as Marinette entered.

 

“Hello everyone, please give a warm welcome to Agent Ladybug.”

 

Instantly, she was rushed by a redhead woman with dark skin. Black glasses perched on her nose and she dressed in a plaid shirt with rolled up sleeves and dark jeans.

 

“You made it past his hazing! I thought you might be the one!”

 

She was replaced by a brunette boy with dark skin, who nodded respectfully at her. “Congrats dudette! Your mission was awesome!”

 

He was pushed back as the redhead held her hand out to Marinette. “Agent Rena Rouge, and this is my partner Agent Carapace.”

 

Giving her hand a quick glance, Marinette shook it. “Pleasure to meet you.”

 

Then the doors opened behind them, and two blondes walked through. “She did outsmart you Chloe, despite all those traps you put up.”

 

“I don’t care how smart she is, she clearly only got to me thanks to the subpar hotel security!”

 

Agent Turtle cleared his throat. “Meet our new agent, Noir and Queen.”

 

Both blondes turned, and both turned alarming shades of red, for different reasons.

 

“YOU! You impersonated me!” Chloe screamed.

 

Marinette raised a brow. “How else was I supposed to get the information off Agent Noir then?”

 

“Calm down, Queenie. She did a good job. I didn’t even get tipped off until she almost escaped.”

 

Noir held a hand out. “I’m Agent Chat Noir. Congratulations. I haven’t been fooled like that in a long time. You did a drunk Queenie quite well.”

 

She shook it. “You almost had me too. I didn’t have enough information or research to go off of.”

 

He smirked. “Paralyzing lipstick, I take it?”

 

“Yes. Normally for civilians who weren’t supposed to see anything.”She blushed.

 

He smiled gently. “Then this will be a beautiful partnership.”

 

“Partnership?” Marinette raised a brow.

 

“PARTNERSHIP?!!” Chloe was apoplectic in anger.

 

“Yes,” Agent Turtle interjected. “Agent Ladybug is new and needs someone to show her the ropes. Agent Queen Bee, you are supposed to be working alone. We need a go between and Agent Chat Noir cannot afford to be partnerless on his field missions. His productivity is as low enough as it is.”

 

Chloe acquiesced with a huff as Marinette heard the amused huff of Agent Noir. “Doesn’t hurt that you’re a good kisser too,” He murmured.

 

She would fervently deny that her fist was purposely aiming for his gut.


End file.
